


Stardust

by rixie_rhee



Series: In the Mood [17]
Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-09
Updated: 2018-01-09
Packaged: 2019-03-02 21:24:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13326657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rixie_rhee/pseuds/rixie_rhee
Summary: For the second time, Nix leads Rissy up the steps and opens the door for her. It is still wooden and heavy, with iron fittings, and it is still cool and nearly clammy in the vestibule. But, inside, oh, is not lit by two lone tapers. There must be a hundred, she thinks in wonder. There must be at least a hundred and they look like stars.“Clarissa, sweetheart,” Nix whispers in her ear, “will you marry me?”“Lew--” There are tears in her eyes that he wipes away.“You kind of have to answer me now, honey. The priest is already here.”





	Stardust

After lunch, they find a _patisserie_ and there is _pain au chocolat,_ and then a single truffle that Rissy eats in one bite. She grins at Lew, chewing with her cheeks puffed out and her nose wrinkled. He shakes his head and smiles back, chuckling at the memory of a time she brought him a chocolate to share--and he ate the whole thing himself. He cups the back of her head with one hand and kisses her until she pulls back, right out in the street, in the middle of the afternoon. There are roses in her cheeks and she ducks her head, but he still catches her expression--and the pulse bounding in her throat. Nix takes her hand and they walk back to their hotel together. It’s the same place he brought her the very first time they came to Paris together. This time the person at the desk is a man who could only be called an older gentleman. He’s whip-thin with severe grey hair but his smile is friendly, after he hears Nix’s fluid French, anyway.

There was lunch, then dessert, and then bed for something that started out sweet and ended up feral. When it’s done, Nix rolls half-way onto his belly, gathers Rissy to him and pulls the sheet over them both. They’ve been together for years, they have three children, a house, and a dog. Yet, things between them haven’t become routine. Rissy’s fingers still slip under Nix’s collar; he still steals kisses when no one’s looking, or when he doesn’t care who sees.

It might be early spring and cold yet in Paris, but they are both flushed, warm and sleepy. And rightly so, they’d had a late night the evening before. Nix knew Paris in all its seasons, before it was occupied and when it was under siege, but Rissy had only ever seen it during wartime and the atmosphere was very different. There were so many things Nix wanted to show her. So he has, and they’ve been back more than a handful of times since that first week-end, but this is the first time it’s been a long visit without little ones in tow.

(They did have a honeymoon, eventually. St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands, the year Richie was two. Emma Charlotte was born when Richie was three. They rented a house and went to the beach and soaked up the sun. One night, when it was either very late or very early and there was no moon, they’d run across the sand and into the ocean, naked and laughing. Rissy made Nix carry her back. She had sand in delicate places and she placed the blame squarely on him.)

Nix wakes up before Rissy does and he lays there in the bed, thanking whatever God there may or may not be for all the good things that have come to him. The sheets come with him as he sits up; his eyes widen when he looks at the girl sleeping beside him. There’s a bruise on Rissy’s side, or rather four of them. Dark purple fingerprints bloom underneath her skin. He pulls the sheet back further to look at her. He’s left suck marks on her breasts and one of her nipples, not to mention her throat. She’s red and swollen between her legs. When she stirs, he leans down to kiss the tip of her nose.

“Hey, cute girl.” Her eyes drift open, her smile is both dreamy and lazy. Rissy stretches and winces; Nix swallows guiltily. What had taken place in the bed had been mutually and enthusiastically enjoyed, but he feels as if he let himself get a bit carried away. He hadn’t wanted to hurt her.

Nix scoops Rissy up gently and carries her to the bathroom and sets her down on the counter. The bathroom is still all pristine white porcelain with silver-toned fixtures. He runs a washcloth under warm water; Rissy leans back and sighs. Nix gently pushes her knees apart to soothe the sore spots he left behind. He washes her tenderly; she lets him move her body, trusting him to take care of her. There are still stars in Rissy’s eyes when she looks up at him. A soft little moan escapes her lips and her hand comes across his naked shoulder, stopping at the back of his neck.

“Lew?”

“Hmm?”

“Shouldn’t we be past all this by now?”

“No, sweetheart. I don’t think that’s ever gonna happen.” Nix kneels in front of her, pulling her hips to the edge of the counter. “I’m sorry if I hurt you.”

“Don’t be, you didn’t, not really. Besides, I don’t mind and no one else will ever see.”

“I love you so much.” His head rests on her knee. “I loved you then, but it’s so much more now.”

She traces his eyebrows and the slope of his nose. “I know, Lew.” He kisses the crease of her knee and she sighs. “You’re everything. I love you, too. I always have.”

His head dips and her hands twine in his hair. There are little speckles of grey there now among those dark strands. Not so much that it’s noticeable from a distance, but they’re definitely there up close. Funny that they have a twelve-year-old child, that Nix could be almost forty and Rissy’s not that far behind him. Neither one of them feels that much different than they ever did. It’s only that you’re supposed to act like a grown-up once you reach a certain age, and they’re both past _that_ by years.

They do an excellent job of appearing to be respectable adults. Of course they are, everyone and everything is well taken care of. But when they’re alone together, sometimes that all falls away. Maybe it’s only fair, considering the way the last years of their youths were spent.

At that moment, neither one of them is thinking about anything but each other. She makes an inarticulate sound and he smiles against her before he stands to kiss her mouth.

“All better?”

“Much.” She grins up at him tiredly. That smile tugs at his heart and he’s hit by a wave of complete and utter affection.

“Do you want a bath?” Rissy nods, and Nix runs her water a hair too hot, filling the deep tub and adding muguet-scented bubbles. He helps her into the clawfoot bath tub and she sinks into the sweet-smelling froth. Much as she washed him so long ago, he washes each individual toe, each finger, each tender, beloved piece of her. His hands pass over her skin, soft and loving. Even though she tries to pull him in with her once she’s all clean, he resists and shakes his head.

“No, there’s somewhere I want to take you.” He kisses her again. “Let’s get you out of there and get you dressed. When he turns, still naked in the humid bathroom, Rissy sees the scratch marks she’s left on his back and she stifles a giggle.

“I’m sorry, Lew,” but her eyes are dancing; she’s anything but contrite and they both know it.

“Yeah, it seems like there’s life in us yet. Get dressed.”

Once she’s in her grey silk dress and her stockings, she’s the very picture of a respectable lady, at least as long as no one looks too closely at her neck. Nix takes her to a book shop, the kind that she loves, where the books are musty and aged and the bookplates bear strangers’ names. Of course, the books are mostly in French, but no matter, he’ll read to her and translate what she doesn’t understand, and she’ll watch his mouth, fascinated. He watches her wind her way through shelves crammed with books. She stretches up and then glances around surreptitiously. Seeing no one but Nix, she steps up onto the ladder and stretches again, one leg extended behind her like a dancer. After all that, whatever book she was reaching for doesn’t meet her expectations and she crams it back into the shelf, not ungently, and only because it wouldn’t fit otherwise.

They pick four. One is the French edition of _Catcher in the Rye_. Rissy has loved Salinger since she read a short story of his in some magazine. It was that one famous line, something about a girl doing nothing but holding the universe together, that made her want to read everything he wrote one summer--she’d lounged by the pool in her bathing suit and Nix’s old aviators and read in the shade. The next is _Les Misérables_ , which Nix maintains is a sort of love letter to Paris. This one is very old and care-worn, the pages will have to be turned gingerly. The third is a novel that neither one of them has never heard of, it appears to be about a girl who fell in love with a soldier during the first world war. The fourth is a volume of botanical sketches that could really be in any language for all the good the spidery script does. Rissy likes the plates inside. There is also a book about Greek mythology which is nearly falling apart. The bookplate reads 1783.

“That’s from before the revolution,” Nix murmurs. Still, it’s in horrible condition, so he sets it aside. Rissy adds it back to their pile.

“I love it here, Lew,” she whispers.

“I thought you might.” He kisses her in a way that usually only happens in private now. Because the world has changed and become more sedate. All the rules that went by the wayside have returned with a vengeance. And besides, they no longer have the excuse of being young and desperate.

It takes a long time for them to make their decisions, they’ve pored over a small pile of books together for the better part of an hour. When Nix and Rissy take their purchases to the counter, a woman who looks a little older than Rissy waits on them. She lovingly caresses the spines before she wraps them into a bundle. The air is wet when they leave the shop and the fresh wind washes away the scent of leather and old paper. Rissy is startled when Nix turns into down a narrow cobblestone alley, seemingly at random.

She smiles here, thinking of the long-ago afternoon when he’d kissed her the very first time. That little shortcut might still exist, but the hotel he’d visited her in that night is no longer there. It has long since been replaced by a restaurant and shops. This saddens Rissy:  nothing stays the same, some people and places live on only in memory, and this is true of more people than it should be. It’s hard to be melancholy, though, because she’s curious. Nix is almost pulling her along, he’s obviously looking for something and she’s not sure what it is. He’s peering into shop windows. When he stops short she very nearly walks into him.

“Here we are, kitten.” It’s an antique shop, one that looks well curated, one you could spend an afternoon sifting through. “I saw something in the window and it made me think of you. At this point, I might as well buy it.”

The bell tinkles over the door when they step inside. Rissy is charmed straight away and Nix speaks to the shop girl. She is a tiny thing with porcelain skin and light brown hair pulled into a ponytail. Her skirt is full and a petticoat peeks out from underneath. She’s in saddle shoes and bobby socks; she’s fifteen at the most, there’s a scab on her shin. This shop must belong to her parents.

Rissy watches as she nods up at Lew. To the girl, he’s just another customer, another tourist in Paris. To Rissy, he’s still the most handsome, vital, _alive_ man she’s ever known. Of course, a child wouldn’t, couldn’t, know what Nix, and Rissy too, have been through. Even if she did _know_ , she couldn’t _understand_. Rissy thinks about her own father, to her he was always just her dad who loved her. They had their little secrets between the two of them, treats shared on the back porch or how he’d let her steer the truck while she sat in his lap, or the tiny sips of beer he’d give her on Saturday afternoons. Just a dad, who was mostly happy and had a farm. The mass of scar tissue on his shoulder was something that had always been there. She’d been six, maybe seven, when she asked him what happened. He’d done nothing more than pat her on the head and continue shaving. It wasn’t until later that she realized her dad hadn’t always been a farmer in Illinois. And it’s the same here, to the girl, Lew is just a man old enough to be her father.

Nearly everyone’s father was in the war. Commonplace. It wouldn’t occur to her that this man stepped out into thin air under a silk canopy. That it looked like he was floating until the earth rose up to knock the wind out of him. That once he made it out of the plane just barely in time, and by the grace of God in whom Rissy still believes, he emerged whole and unhurt, but not unscathed.

The shop girl turns to fetch something from the window and she takes it away to wrap it in brown paper. Nix picks the package up and carries it under his arm.

“Ready to go back?”

Rissy nods and she’s thankful when he hails a cab. Nix opens the door for her and she slides all the way over. When he climbs in, he pulls her to the middle and puts their purchases on her other side. Rissy settles under Nix’s arm and plays with his fingers. The cab hits a pothole and she winces. She _is_ sore, the quiet throbbing makes her glad they’re not walking. Nix catches the fleeting expression, tucks a lock of hair behind her ear, and whispers that he’s sorry.

Nix helps her out of the car when they get back to their hotel. It’s started raining, cold little droplets with no force behind them at all. He carries the packages in one hand and the other cups her elbow, all the way through the lobby and the elevator ride and down the hall to their suite. Nix unlocks the door and deposits the parcels on the nearest chair. Then he lifts Rissy in his arms and carries her to the big bed, where he sets her down. The maid has been in to clean; it’s freshly made and the pillows are fluffed.

“Do you want champagne? I’ll call down.”

“Are you sure?”

“It’ll be fine. It’s mostly for you, and besides, I think you could use the ice.” He’s already picked up the telephone, and before long the bucket is there, with two flutes, and the green bottle resting on melting crystalline cubes. Nix goes into the bathroom for a washcloth, Rissy takes off every stitch she has on and slips under the sheet, modestly covering herself. She can hear the water running, and then it’s off and her Lew is back. He scoops up some of the ice and wraps it up neatly before he draws the sheet back to find her naked.

“Here, dear, let me see.” She moves her thighs apart slightly and lets out a small whine when he touches her. The cold feels wonderful. Nix covers her to the waist with the sheet and the soft, thin blanket.

He takes off his shirt and his pants, and his socks, too, and busies himself with the champagne while Rissy watches. He pours the smallest little bit for himself, and she knows he won’t even finish that. When Nix climbs into the bed in his undershirt and his boxers, he settles back against the pillows, and Rissy moves to put her head in his lap. Lew begins to read, holding the novel in one hand. The other starts out on her shoulder, but before long it’s skating over warm bare skin while he reads to her in French and her ice melts.

“More?”

She nods in response, and he gets up for more ice.

Rissy gazes up at him while he reads aloud, her fingers brush his ribs, and every once in a while she’ll ask a question when she doesn’t understand something he’s said. She can understand and speak far better than she can read or write, and though she is more than capable, she still has nothing on Lew.

It continues to rain in the typical Paris fashion, but inside it is warm and cozy. When she starts to drowse, Nix puts the book down and takes another sip from his flute. His nose wrinkles and Rissy reaches to caress his cheek.

“Adorable,” she coos at him.

“Hey, do you want your present?”

Her eyes are wide and innocent when she nods up at him. She kneels up on the bed and waits for him. It’s a small leather-covered chest, and the inside is filled with trays and compartments. In the bottom, in the smallest compartment, she finds the second part of her gift. The stone is blue and the setting is a white metal. Her hands are shaking and he’s glad he can still make her feel that way.

“That is a blue diamond,” he says, taking her right hand and slipping the ring onto her finger. “Very rare, precious. I saw the damn box a week ago and I wanted to buy it for you then. And then today, the ring was there, too.”

“How did you know? We didn’t go anywhere near there today.”

“I only saw it when we got there, honey.” He pauses, swallows. “Some things are just supposed to happen.”

“I suppose they are.” She’s whispering even though no one else is there. She holds out her hand admires the cool fire. “It’s beautiful, Lew.”

“It’s very old.” The band is slightly irregular. “It’s a symbol of love and peace, care and strength.”

“It’s perfect.” She cups his face and there is a very long moment in which no one says anything. Nix swallows and the spell is broken.

“I want to take you somewhere tomorrow. We’ll be gone for the day and one night.”

“So we’re taking a vacation from our vacation?”

“Something like that.”

That evening, Rissy orders room service, and she’s happy her French is still understandable when unaccompanied by expressions and gestures. She and Nix eat in the bed and then he reads to her some more. She falls asleep with her head on his chest and Nix doesn’t want to wake her to turn the lamp off. He lies there with her, liking her warmth and the softness of her skin. She wakes up briefly, murmuring something about needing her kiss good-night. Nix switches to turn the lamp off. The air feels cool on his bare skin, but then Rissy’s hand sleepily tugs his arm back under the covers and around the familiar contours of her body.

 

* * *

 

 

Rissy thinks their little side trip is Versailles, because that is the first place they go the next morning. It is lovely, and Nix thinks Rissy is lovely when she’s reflected a million times in the Hall of Mirrors. He thinks she’s lovely in the garden and lovelier still in the Petit Trianon. But it is only mid-afternoon when they leave, and he takes her the kind of country inn that’s only pretending to be quaint and is really luxurious. She showers and dresses in a soft spring dress, very pale blue. It reminds him of one she used to have right after the war, a new one she had when he finally came home, when skirts weren’t as full and a little bit shorter. It suits her, much as the old one had.

Nix has arranged for someone to drive them to their destination. The car is sleek and black, and it winds mellowly through the late afternoon. Nix is nervous, pulling at his collar and fussing with his tie. Rissy wonders where in the world he’s taking her or what he’s done to make him so restless.

The countryside starts to look vaguely familiar, and then more so, until Rissy knows exactly where they are when the car comes to a stop. Nix opens the door to help her out, wanting to do it himself instead of letting the driver do it. Nix leads her through the near-dusk, into the town square where he once kissed her good-bye and where she smiled and waited to cry until he wouldn’t see. They pass the war memorial and the school-turned-hospital that is a school once again. They do not revisit the courtyard behind it. The church across the way still looks like it is out of a storybook. It is the same as the last time either one of them saw it, unchanged. This is where he’s taking her.

For the second time, Nix leads Rissy up the steps and opens the door for her. It is still wooden and heavy, with iron fittings, and it is still cool and nearly clammy in the vestibule. But, inside, oh, is not lit by two lone tapers. There must be a hundred, she thinks in wonder. There must be at least a hundred and they look like stars.

“Clarissa, sweetheart,” Nix whispers in her ear, “will you marry me?”

“Lew--” There are tears in her eyes that he wipes away.

“You kind of have to answer me now, honey. The priest is already here.”

She nods, the priest, still fat but now much older, leads them through their vows in French, and even after all this time, after three children and three houses, and fifteen years, Nix’s wedding kisses are still deep and bruising and his bride still kisses him back with abandon.

There are no distant fires only stars, the air is fresh and not acrid, no shouting, no artillery, only fragrant breezes and soft sounds of nature setting into night. When they slide into the back seat, Nix pulls his wife practically into his lap. They are both still shameless and extravagant in their affection. The French driver wonders idly if the woman is the man’s mistress.

 

* * *

 

 

Later, back in their room, Nix and Rissy dance to old records, music no one plays on the radio anymore. He spins her, and she twirls on one foot, laughing. She’s in his underwear again, in his t-shirt, dancing barefoot. When Nix and Rissy finally go to bed, when the sky is at its darkest as dawn will soon come, they’re wrapped in nothing but white cotton and one another.


End file.
